'No standing rule of the House shall be rescinded or changed without one day's notice of the motion therefor.'
"This clause of the rule, if applicable at all, may fairly be construed to make it in order under the standing rules of the House to consider any motion to rescind or change the rules after one day's notice.
"But the question for the Chair to decide is this: Are the rules of this House to be so construed as to give to the minority of the House the absolute right to prevent the majority or a quorum of the House from making any new rules for its government; or in the absence of anything in the rules providing for any mode of proceeding in the matter of consideration, when the question of changing the rules is before the House, shall the rules be so construed as to virtually prevent their change should one-fifth of the House oppose it? It may be well to keep in mind that paragraph 2 of section 5 of article 1 of the Constitution says that—
'Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings.'
"The same section of the Constitution provides that—
'A majority of each House shall constitute a quorum to do business.'
"The right given to the House to determine the rules of its proceedings is never exhausted, but is at all times a continuing right, and in the opinion of the Chair gives a right to make or alter rules independent of any rules it may adopt. Dilatory motions to prevent the consideration of business are comparatively recent expedients, and should not be favored in any case save where absolutely required by some clear rule of established practice.
"In any case it is a severe strain upon common sense to construe the rules so as to prevent a quorum of the House from taking any proceedings at all required by the Constitution; and it is still more difficult to find any justification for holding that the special resolutions of this House adopted December 19th last, or the standing rules even of the House, were intended to prevent the House, if a majority so desired, from altering or abrogating the present rules of the House.
"There seems to be abundant precedent for the view the Chair takes.
The Clerk will read from the Record of the Forty-third Congress,
volume ix, page 806, an opinion expressed by the distinguished
Speaker, Mr. Blaine, which has been repeatedly alluded to to-day.
"The Clerk read as follows: